Recommendations for video game novels?

Wasn't sure if this belonged in General but it seems like Off-Topic is more appropriate. I'm an avid reader and over the summer have been finishing up my backlog of books to read.

For some reason I have always enjoyed video game novels. Some of them are wonderful for filling out the lore of a particular world while others just contain a lot of action. So I am looking for some new game novels to add to my list.

So far I have read many of the "Halo" novels and a few "Metal Gear" novels. Any recommendations would be wonderful!

I liked the Resident Evil novels were pretty cool, as are the Doom novels (if you can find them). Speaking of Doom, Masters of Doom was a great read if you are interesting in how the game got made and how FPS games took over the world in the 90's... Good stuff. Lots of great info on Carmack and Romero.

The Witcher books are fantastic and there are fan translations of the ones that haven't had an official release in english yet, the games are actually a non-canon spinoff of the books though. The first 3 Mass Effect novels are pretty enjoyable as well as the comics. Alan Wake is really really good but it's just a novelization of the game.

The Gears novels are actually really good reads and give a lot of insight into the lore of the games. Karen Traviss wrote them (writer for Gears 3) and went on to do Halo: Glasslands, so have faith that she can put a story together!

If you can find any the Nintendo Adventure books are really unique. After all its not often you get to read a choose your own adventure book staring different Nintendo characters. As stated by other posters the Resident Evil novels by S.D. Perry do a pretty good job of novelizing the games.

Read a book that isn't a video game. I swear they are good too. Hell, if literature scares you then read books that make you with they were a video game. Or books about video games but not set in video games.

Read a book that isn't a video game. I swear they are good too. Hell, if literature scares you then read books that make you with they were a video game. Or books about video games but not set in video games.

The OP already said he was an avid reader. Stop being such a snarky git. Sometimes people like to read pulpy crap.

On topic - While only loosely connected to video games, I find some of the Warhammer 40k novels can be fairly enjoyable. The Horus Heresy series is generally considered the best jumping on point if you aren't that familiar with the universe, and the first 3 to 5 novels are easily the best.

My choices are all books that give a lot of background about the motivations of characters in some of my favorite franchises. Not only did they give some context about characters and their motivations but it also added to the enjoyment of the games themselves.

I really enjoyed the first two Dragon Age Novels. Believe the first one is called The Stolen Throne and the second one is the Calling and give a lot of insight into DA: Origins and the expansion.

Mass Effect: Revelations give a lot of good background on Saren and Captain Anderson. I didn't particularly care for any of the others though.

If you're into Dead Space, then Dead Space: Martyr is pretty great, it's basically a prequel to everything and gives a pretty cool back story to one of the major background characters of the Dead Space world and pulls a pretty cool little twist with him, so that was cool.

I haven't finished reading it yet but Metro 2033 is also pretty great, it's not really a video game book though seeing as how it came first and the game came second, but if you're into them it's worth checking out, it's pretty cool seeing the differences between the two. In the game the main character shoots like all of the things but in the book I don't think he's even killed anything by where I am at yet, so that's interesting.

Edit: Oh also I really recommend Starship Titanic, it's the novel version of the game that Douglas Adams did, written/adapted by one of his friends and Monty Python member Terry Jones. So yeah a space adventure and comedy by Douglas Adams and Terry Jones, holy shit, how could someone not read it?

Read a book that isn't a video game. I swear they are good too. Hell, if literature scares you then read books that make you with they were a video game. Or books about video games but not set in video games.

The OP already said he was an avid reader. Stop being such a snarky git. Sometimes people like to read pulpy crap.

On topic - While only loosely connected to video games, I find some of the Warhammer 40k novels can be fairly enjoyable. The Horus Heresy series is generally considered the best jumping on point if you aren't that familiar with the universe, and the first 3 to 5 novels are easily the best.

Thank you creepingdeath. I am an avid reader and 90% of what I read is non-videogame related. I just recently finished re-reading "Jurassic Park" and "Invasion of the Bodysnatchers". I really do enjoy the pulpy crap books as well. For instance I read a bunch of $2.00 Kindle horror books, the Alien novels, etc. Literature can come in many forms and sometimes I'm in the mood for something silly or just fun.

But I do feel you darknessmyoldfriend. Video game novels are probably not the place to go if you are looking for great fiction. However, like the dumb B movies I watch a lot, it is sometimes fun to read something stupid and quick.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I've updated my Amazon wish list with most of the titles mentioned here.

I... I've read a few Mass Effect books. The first Halo one as well, lent to me by a Halo fanatic friend when we were testers together.

I've definitely been there. It can be nice to tear through a 250 page novel in a day. Cotton candy books. I've also ready plenty of trash pulp non-video game books, basically anything with a spaceship on the cover that happened to show up in the book rack of my neighborhood book rack that I ran across as a teen, not to mention Star Trek and Star Wars books.

Ugh, somewhere in a box in storage somewhere are probably some Voyager novels. I should just let Jarrod and Brandi find that, make it their problem.

I highly recommend Halo: The Fall of Reach. It's a great introduction to the universe and characters and expands in all directions. It's basically Starship Troopers meets Ender's Game. In fact I recommend all three of the Eric Nylund Halo books: Fall of Reach, First Strike, and Ghosts of Onyx.

If you want to read something really shitty, give any of the Warcraft books written by Richard A. Knaak a try. I have NO idea why Blizzard decided this guy should write all of their books, literally EVERY other author they had writing for them was better than this guy. I used to love this shit back in middle and high school when I was really into World of Warcraft, but now I cringe after reading just a few pages. 'The Last Guardian' was the last decent book they put out before Richard A. Knaak became their 'official' writer. I won't say it's very good, but it's not bad.

I remember reading Halo: First Strike years ago, and I liked it at the time.

I really enjoyed the Halo novels along with the Eve Online book that came out few years ago. I've read most of the Diablo, Warcraft & Starcraft books but those are really hit and miss. I also read the book for Infinity Blade (I really enjoy the author Brandon Sanderson)

I'd really recommend Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson, just enjoyable!

I just read Assassin's Creed forsaken a couple of days ago on my kindle. It's quite short but I thought it was good and it supplemented the plot of Assassin's Creed III well. The book is written in a diary format and the entire story is in Haytham Kenway's point of view; it covers his time from a child all the way up to the end of ACIII. It gave me an entirely different point of view about what happened over the course of ACIII and I actually enjoyed it more than the game (of course I guess that may not mean much since I enjoyed ACIII less than any of the other titles so far). Essentially it's connective tissue between the plot for ACIV and ACIII.

I really loved the Resident Evil novels by S.D. Perry when I was a kid. Haven't read them in years but I imagine they hold up pretty well. The only one that I remember not liking was the one based on RE Zero. The RE2 novel and the two original stories she did were pretty awesome. She even added a new character to the arc that appeared in or was at least mentioned in all the books that changed the fiction from that of the games.

Deus Ex: Icarus Effect was also a very good read and set up Human Revolution quite nicely. I've heard shockingly good things about the Borderlands novel, as well, but I haven't read it myself.

The Ico novelisation. I think playing the game is a must before reading it, else you don't really get the real impact.

Also, read it at your own risk. Ico is all about the mystery and obfuscation, and while there's a solid narrative that flows well with the depicted game, it reveals the nature of the world and Ico. I was left conflicted on whether I should have read it.

Can books that games are based on (like Metro 2033 and The Witcher novels) really be considered "video game novels?" I mean that's a little like calling the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy a video game novel because of the text adventure game from the 1980's. Also, from what I've read (only the first book so far), The Witcher is pretty excellent.